I used to do background checks for security companies. I had to verify previous employment. There are some on-line paid services (The Work Number) that have a database of employee records from some very large companies. This will usually confirm dates of employment and job titles.
Other companies will verbally confirm employment and dates and sometimes job titles.
The most reluctant HR person is usually brought around by a signed release stating the information can be passed on to me.
IIRC, I only had one company that refused to answer any request. That ended up with people higher up the ladder looking into it.
TL/DR: I don’t know if there is a legal obligation to verify employment but it rarely gets to that point. Something like the example in the OP was not anything I ever encountered.
There might be in an issue with how the company doesn’t confirm employment.
The extremes are:
“Joe never worked here.”
“We do not ever provide employment confirmation.”
The first can get the firm in trouble if Joe had in fact worked there. The last shouldn’t (if the policy is true). In between …, well, that’s why lawyers exist.
One local university got into trouble (losing a lawsuit) because they didn’t handle requests for employment verification for one ex-employee per their usual policy (not a legal requirement). They were being spiteful and borderline misleading. Payout ensues.
My statement was only to clarify that two lawyers experienced in that field gave their opinion that it is not required.
Uniformly ignoring such requests, or better, saying “We do not ever provide employment confirmation”, therefore is valid. Lying (or misinforming) is a different matter.
I don’t know the reasons why an employer might have a policy of never confirming anyone’s employment there, but it’s none of my business.
One of my co-workers raised his voice as he received a call, just so we’d be in on the fun. "I’m sorry, did you say you wanted a recommendation for Miles McIntyre?"
We all gathered around to hear him spout such gems as "Just in case Mr. McIntyre has a team of crackerjack lawyers, I’ll just say YES, he technically worked here… given a loose interpretation of the word work."
He had a few other good lines: “I’m going to label his attendance and punctuality adequate. And will never mention the fact that we got more done when he wasn’t here.”
“Since I’d hate to be sued by Mr. Miles McIntyre, I’ll just say that some people might claim to have seen a potential for becoming a passable leader… someday.”
There are also people who will call to confirm if an employee is currently employed there. I used to answer them affirmatively, until I realized that that was just lawyers looking to collect garnishments.
If you are a private business, you are under no obligation to answer any other private entity’s questions, and only need to answer questions from govt agencies that are relevant (Jobs and family services or some such).
Yeah, I had meant to bring up work I did years ago doing background checks for clients. This was supposed to be my cite that they don’t have to tell you anything. But it was rare that a past employer wouldn’t at least give you the minimum.
The Work Number can also be a good tool for doing skip traces. Not like that computer Garcia has on Criminal Minds, but a moderately decent tool that few people have access to.
I hadn’t retired yet as a Deputy. The Sheriff didn’t like people working as P.I.'s because he was afraid we’d use official records in the course of PI work. But it was just the opposite. I had cops coming to me trying to get info on someone. I had some friends inside utility companies that could also be very useful in finding someone who skipped town. Unless they took on a completely new identity eventually they can be found.
Thanks for clearing that up, I just thought you couldn’t talk “shit” but had to confirm dates of employment. I’m not a lawyer and I don’t play one on tv. I guess my “thinking” was wrong.
For those of you who don’t know, Charles Cullen was an RN who killed numerous patients over a period of years. He always worked for agencies, because he was unable to hold a steady job in large part due to severe alcoholism.
The whole “dates only” thing came from people who were blackballed because former employers said things about them that were NOT true.
It’s been stated above that a previous employer is under no obligation to confirm or deny that someone worked there in the past. However, if I (and I’m the one that takes these calls) was going to decline to answer them, I think it would be good policy to take an all or none approach. That is, confirm dates anytime a potential employer calls or just use a stock “I’m sorry, we have a policy not to disclose that type of information” for all of them.
Not that I think anyone is going to get in legal trouble, but it makes it easier if/when an old employee shows up asking 'why you said I never worked here" and you can explain that you only said you don’t confirm or deny it.
Also, I wanted to touch on something else. It’s often stated (here, even) that you could get in legal trouble for saying that an employee was good and they turn out to be bad. ISTM (if that was even true) to defend that would be to say that they were a good employee when they worked for you/at your workplace/under your management/during that time span. You have no responsibility for how good of an employee they are at a different business/with a different manager/in a different place in their life.
And with that, I assume most people know that ‘this person is/isn’t eligible for rehire’ is just a way to sidestep that question.
FWIW, currently, I’ll verify that the person worked at my store and the dates, but that’s as far as I’ll go. If I feel it’s a collection agency/lawyer for a current employee, I typically just hang up. For a past employee I tell them they no longer work here and no, I don’t know where they work now.
They then go into my phone blocker so they can’t call back unless it’s from a different number (unless they’re calling from the state/government which often happens for wage attachment issues).
Is your acquaintance some kind of idiot? They admit that she worked for them and then in the same sentence says they won’t admit whether she worked for them. What?
In the discussion over whether one should characterize a person’s employment or provide a recommendation… Do these same managers ever hire a terrible employee and then realize that the bad hire might have been avoided if the last employer had answered honestly? By that I mean: Do any of these managers come to regret this policy when they, themselves, are the ones denied important information?
Not exactly, he was hired and fired by some hospitals he worked at, in one case they offered him a choice between resigning with a neutral review or being fired. Not wanting to be sued for bad reviews was one of the reasons cited to justify their behavior.
It is not a policy that is created or implemented by individual managers. If I, as a manager, decide to give all and every iota of information I can about an ex-employee’s performance, how does that have any effect on the information that I get from another company?
Besides, 90% of an employee’s performance is directly related to their work environment, so the information about how they performed in their work environment may not have any relevancy as to how they will work out in mine.
I have had many calls to verify employment and even wage amounts for employees, ranging from those who have applied for mortgages/car loans to daycare centers that insist the parent’s workplace not be too far from their facility. It’s true that there is absolutely no obligation to respond, but those requests are something the employee wants, so I always followed through on them. Ya got to keep your peeps happy!
As for wage garnishments, the only legal ones(at least in Texas) are for child support/alimony from the Office of the Attorney General, and the Feds will do it through the IRS for unpaid income taxes and guaranteed student loans that are in default. Those are demands, not requests, and are always in writing. Again, this is for Texas, so YMMV.
I too will divulge wages and other more personal info when the person is in the process of getting a loan. If I can, I’ll verify it with them, but it would be nice if they’d give me a heads up. But, like I said, I’m not talking to collections agencies. Just hang up and put their number in the call blocker.
Wisconsin too. They come in the mail, from the Department of Workforce Development and get mailed or faxed back to them (and lately they’ve been using a website).
Those, I really don’t have a choice. In Wisconsin, and I assume other states as well, if I [the employer] don’t withhold wages as instructed I’M responsible for the entire amount. IOW, if you’re getting $5000 garnished and I blow off the paperwork and don’t do it, I owe that money. For that reason, I don’t mess around with those things. Also, I won’t stop garnishing the wages until I get a letter from the state saying I can. Generally that means an extra week or so, but again, I’m going to do as instructed.
I know some employees have found a way around it. Between the time I hire someone and the time I get the request to garnish their wages is usually about 3 weeks. I’ve had plenty of employees over the years only work for me for about two weeks and then stop showing up. I assume it’s so they can get in and out before the attachment paperwork shows up.
Oh yeah, of course. Although I think I’ve only had that happen once, and I spoke with the employee on the same phone first, then they handed the phone to the loan officer. Most of the time, they just want me to print their paystubbs. (They are completely incapable of hanging onto them, which I don’t discourage by being as agreeable to reprint them as I am.)
As far as verifying employment, I don’t think there is any requirement, but as far as garnishment orders, I am pretty sure I need to follow those in Ohio. I got a certified letter from the county courthouse telling me that I had to start withholding from one of my employee’s paychecks and sending it to them for a judgement that she had against her. That was an annoying 10 minutes of paperwork every payroll cycle.
I’ve also had child support withholding orders.
As far as benefits, I have employees that I have to fill out a form for once every few paycycles in order for them to keep whatever it is that they are getting, but I’ve never had them call me about the info.
That’s pretty fast. I had an employee working for me for 2 years before I got her garnishment order. She had apparently left her last job because it had caught up with her, and was planning on quitting on me in order to stay ahead of it.
I guess I’m phrasing this badly, and if so I apologize. My thought is: Each individual applies this policy at their own discretion. Got it. But I’m assuming the practice did not originate spontaneously. Some employers started it, and then it spread when other employers adopted it and people in business schools started recommending it as a best practice. So the fact that people do it means employers have collectively decided that mitigating the risk of lawsuits outweigh the benefit that comes from knowing a candidate’s reputation.
I think what I mean to ask is: Does anyone in the business world make a bad hire and then think, “Wow, this policy is really stupid and I wish people would stop doing it?” Because it seems very cowardly and self-defeating to me.
I’m not a business owner, but I find this very counter-intuitive. I would think that a person’s conduct and past performance would be of paramount importance - probably even more so than their objective qualifications. (My most recent career was military, where your previous supervisors’ opinions are basically the ONLY thing that matters.)
I own a small business in a rural location. I’ve had other business owners ask me for my “off the record” opinion and I’ve given it. “Eligible for rehire? Only if they were holding a gun to my child’s head”.
Unclear writing on my part. My acquaintance was relating to me that yes this person had worked for them and it had been a disaster, and then said (again, to me) that “hell no, I wasn’t going to verify that idiot’s employment here”. To the caller, my acquaintance refused to answer the question.